Statement: Using the US Postal Service to return the samples did not violate Department of Transportation (DOT) regulations; however, the shipment did not come with a Battelle radioactive material (BRM) number by freight carrier to the Battelle Shipping and Receiving Warehouse (BSRW) on 6th Street where it would have been handled correctly. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) does not send radioactive samples--at any level--through the mail.

Discussion: In 2012, a PNNL staff member sent three concrete samples--one spiked with trace amounts of uranium--to Washington State University for analysis. WSU returned the results and an invoice in the spring of 2013, but not the samples. In October 2014, long after the staff member had left the Lab, WSU unexpectedly mailed the samples to a second individual at PNNL. She opened the box in her office, recognized the radiological marking, and called a Radiation Protection Technologist.

Analysis: The person who originated the sample shipment to WSU no longer works at the Lab and it is not known what expectations were communicated to WSU for disposition of the samples or whether they were accompanied by a "chain of custody" (COC) form. COC forms are used to assign sample responsibility and custody to others and can be used to set expectations for delivering return shipments to PNNL according to our protocol.

Three men have been taken to hospital after being splashed by a highly corrosive chemical on-board a ship.

The UK coastguard in Falmouth and the RNAS Culdrose Sea King rescue helicopter were scrambled to assist the chemical tanker near Lands' End at 10pm yesterday.

The crew, who were travelling to Hamburg in Germany, raised a distress call when three men ‰?? all of whom are of Indian decent and in their mid 20s ‰?? came in to contact with concentrated nitric acid.

A spokesman for the UK coastguard in Falmouth said: "We sought medical advice from the Queen Alexandra Hospital in Portsmouth and they advised an immediate evacuation.

"The men were walking wounded ‰?? certainly one has suffered back and head injuries, one eye injuries and I am not sure about the third.

"As I am not a medic I would not like to say if their injuries are life-threatening."

Due to gale-force winds, the helicopter was unable to rescue the men at sea, instead the tanker was forced to take shelter in Mounts Bay while the crew of the Sea King lifted them off-board.

The operation finished at 3am and all three men have been taken to the Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro for treatment.

BEAUMONT -At about 5:45 a.m. Monday ExxonMobil says a fire at it's Beaumont chemical plant is out. According to an ExxonMobil spokesperson everyone is accounted for and no one was hurt.

The fire started around midnight Monday when a vapor release from a propylene line caught fire.

Spokesperson Lee Dula says the fire at the plant off Madison Ave. caused some of the workers in the chemical plant to be moved to alternative locations. Some workers were allowed to go home. However all personnel are being told to report for their scheduled shifts and check in with their supervisors.

He adds ongoing air monitoring continues to indicates no impacts to the community.

RAS TANURA, EASTERN PROVINCE ‰?? A fire at Aramco‰??s petroleum refinery laboratory in Ras Tanura was reported on Friday and no one was injured. Aramco reported that the emergency team of firefighters extinguished the fire and a committee was been formed to investigate the cause of the fire. The fire did not hinder the laboratory‰??s work and everything continued as normal.

Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin on Friday signed into law a bill that significantly reduces the scope and strength of a chemical tank safety bill passed a year ago in the wake of the Freedom Industries leak and the resulting regionwide water crisis.

The bill (SB423) exempts from new safety and inspection requirements more than 36,000 chemical tanks that would have been covered by the law unanimously approved last year to avoid a repeat of the Freedom chemical leak that contaminated the drinking water for 300,000 people in the Kanawha Valley and surrounding communities.

An opt-out provision allowing tank owners to comply with existing state permits instead of the new tank standards is expected to drop that number to perhaps as few as 90 tanks covered by the safety law.

In a prepared statement, the governor said the bill ‰??represents reasonable steps to ensure protection of our drinking water resources by focusing on the tanks that pose the most risk.‰??

COLUMBUS (Tara Morgan) -- The truck driver involved in a hazmat scare that shut down I-71 south for hours Thursday afternoon is facing charges, according to the Columbus Division of Police.

Richard Holloway of Columbia, S.C., is charged with disobeying a traffic control device and improper transport of hazardous materials, police announced Friday.Police say an officer stopped Holloway for suspicion of transporting hazardous material. The officer then approached the semi and "was overcome by fumes from the tanker. He also observed liquid leaking from one of the valves."

The officer and Holloway removed themselves from the area and notified the Columbus Division of Fire about a possible hazmat situation.

The officer spotted a leak, but it was hours before hazmat crews figured out that it wasn't the cargo but condensation, ABC6/FOX28's Tara Morgan reported. Emergency crews dressed head-to-toe in hazmat gear climbed all over the tanker Thursday.

The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio responded to the scene and took the tanker out of service due to a faulty safety valve which contributed to the fumes emitting from the tanker. Police say the officer was taken to the hospital as a precaution and later released.

At least 19 people were injured Thursday, three of them critically, in a suspected gas explosion and a subsequent seven-alarm fire originating at 121 Second Ave. in New York City‰??s East Village neighborhood. Two of the critically injured suffered burns to their airways while the other fell unconscious following the explosion, according to Fire Department of New York Commissioner Daniel Nigro, who added that the ‰??majority of those injured were injured in the initial explosion.‰??

Two adjoining buildings, 119 and 125 Second Ave., have been directly affected by the fire, while two others, 121 and 123 Second Ave., collapsed. The FDNY contained the fire to those four buildings as of 6 p.m. EDT.

In a televised press conference, Mayor Bill de Blasio said independent contractors were working on the gas systems at 121 Second Ave. just prior to the explosion, although a reason for the explosion has not been verified. Con Edison, the utility company that supplies most of the city‰??s buildings with gas, had inspected a new meter system at the building at around 2 p.m. EDT Thursday. The work was ultimately not approved and Con Edison provided instructions for fixing those issues. It was unclear if that work is related to the explosion.

‰??We have the Department of Environmental Protection hazmat operation responding to check for the environmental impact and the health impact,‰?? said de Blasio.

ELMHURST ‰?? The Elmhurst Fire Department responded Wednesday morning to a fire at Sandburg Middle School that was apparently caused by a chemical reaction in a science classroom, according to a city news release.

When fire crews arrived at about 9:45 a.m., they found heavy smoke coming from a classroom on the school's lower level, the release stated.

School administrators reported all students and staff were evacuated and accounted for. The investigation revealed a chemical reaction had triggered the fire, which was extinguished by an automatically activated sprinkler system, according to the release.

The fire department performed maintenance to replace the activated sprinkler head, ventilated the area with a smoke ejector, and performed cleanup as needed. No students were present in the classroom at the time of the incident, and no injuries were reported, the release stated.

Damage was limited to ceiling tiles, classroom supplies and audio-video equipment, and it is estimated to be $11,000, according to the release.

PITTSBURG, Calif. (KGO) -- A Public Health Advisory has been lifted after a Level 2 chemical release at the Dow Chemical plant in Pittsburg.

It happened just before 3 a.m. Dow said the chemical can irritate people, and that could lead to problems like watery eyes, sore throats, and breathing issues. A Contra Costa County hazardous materials team is on the scene to deal with the release.

JANESVILLE, Wis.--- Some homes in the 1700 block of Green Valley Drive are being evacuated near a chemical spill on I-90. Police described the evacuations as minimal. The Janesville Hazmat team monitored the neighborhood air quality and did not receive any dangerous readings.

The spill was caused by an accident involving two semi trucks. A semi truck side swiped another semi truck that was stalled along the interstate because of a small electrical fire. One of the semi trucks was carrying pool chemicals and all the chemicals started leaking after the accident.

The incident happened on the westbound Interstate 39/90 near mile marker 172. Westbound traffic on the Interstate is closed from E. Racine Street to US 14.

Hazmat crews are working to identify up to 15 different chemicals. The chemicals started mixing together and a heat reaction occurred, but it has subsided now.

The Environmental Protection Agency released an analysis of frack water on Friday, based on data that drillers supplied to the website FracFocus. The EPA‰??s report is just one part of the agency‰??s long awaited fracking study, which will assess the impacts of hydraulic fracturing on drinking water supplies. The full report is due out this spring.

The EPA researchers say less than one percent of frack fluid in their analysis of 39,000 wells contained additives, while water made up 88 percent of the fluid, and sand, or quartz, made up ten percent. The agency identified 692 separate frack water ingredients. Maximum concentrations of these chemicals were usually below 2 percent of the total mass, while half of the chemicals were below 0.3 percent of mass. EPA science advisor Tom Burke told reporters on a press call that the chemical additives and volumes of water varied greatly from well to well. Water usage for each fracked well ranged from 35,000 gallons to 7.2 million gallons.

‰??While these maximum concentrations [of chemical additives] are low percentages of the overall fracturing fluid,‰?? said Burke, ‰??more than half the wells had water volumes greater than 1.5 million gallons. So a small percentage may mean hundreds or thousands of gallons of chemicals could be transported to, and present on, the well pad prior to mixing on the fracking fluid. Remember one percent of a million gallons is a large number ‰?? 10,000 gallons.‰??

The three top chemicals used in the frack fluid were hydrochloric acid, methanol, and hydro-treated light petroleum distillates. Hydrochloric acid is used to keep the well casings free of mineral build-ups, while methanol is used to increase viscosity. Petroleum distillates are refined products like diesel, kerosene, or fuel oil, and are used to make the fluid ‰??slick,‰?? or soapy, and thereby reduce friction.

TOPEKA, Kan. ‰??A science experiment gone awry has injured three high school students in Topeka.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reported that liquid from the experiment spilled onto the floor and ignited during class Wednesday afternoon at Highland Park High School. District spokesman Ron Harbaugh said in an email Thursday that the fire spread to the feet of three students.

Harbaugh said the students were taken for medical treatment, but he didn't elaborate on the degree of their injuries. The email said two of the students were in school Thursday and that the third student was expected to be at school Friday.

Harbaugh also didn't go into much detail about the science experiment, except to say it "had been done numerous times in the class."

Call it another form of March Madness: not flying basketballs, but flying manhole covers.

Scientific literature traces manhole explosions back nearly a century, but a series of such incidents in Indianapolis, host of the NCAA basketball championships, has authorities looking for a quick solution.

Good luck with that.

A combination of power system design, winter road salt, older electrical cable insulation and basic chemistry have triggered underground explosions in older downtowns, launching 350-pound manhole covers high in the air. One Georgia Tech engineering professor calculated the explosions could have the force of three sticks of dynamite.

"They have found a manhole cover on top of a building in a certain downtown city," said Daniel O'Neill, who advises several utilities on the problem. "They are dangerous things. There are hundreds of these things happening every year."

Manhole covers have launched several stories in the air, O'Neill said.

The nonprofit Electric Power Research Institute's lab in Lenox, Massachusetts, has spent the last 25 years setting off what officials there call "manhole events." It's not for fun. Engineers are trying to find a way to keep manhole covers from flying.

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